I am oppressed with a dread of living forever. That is the only disadvantage of vegetarianism.

It is very doubtful whether man is enough of a political animal to produce a good, sensible, serious and efficient constitution. All the evidence is against it.

The seven deadly sins... food, clothing, firing, rent, taxes, respectability and children. Nothing can lift those seven millstones from Man's neck but money; and the spirit cannot soar until the millstones are lifted.

My situation is a solemn one: life is offered to me on the condition of eating beefsteaks. But death is better than cannibalism. My will contains directions for my funeral, which will be followed, not by mourning coaches, but by oxen, sheep, flocks of poultry, and a small traveling aquarium of live fish, all wearing white scarves in honor of the man who perished rather than eat his fellow creatures. It will be, without the exception of Noah's Ark, the most remarkable thing of its kind ever seen.

An English army led by an Irish general: that might be a match for a French army led by an Italian general.

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.

The most anxious man in a prison is the governor.